vera’s passing « Letters from Grenada

vera’s passing

In the months before Grandma Vera passed, my biggest fear was that she might suffer very greatly. I’d heard stories about Parkinsonians who had become unable to swallow and had essentially starved to death. Very slowly. With their minds intact. So when I prayed about Grandma, I prayed that once she could not take nourishment, she might leave us quickly.

On the Thursday, she ate well, for the last time.

On the Friday, she laid in her bed all day, hardly moving and speaking not at all. When my aunt and uncle called from the States that afternoon, I almost told them to call back some other time. But they had my great-uncle on the phone, and he wanted to talk to his little sister. So I held the phone to her ear, and watched in amazement as her beautiful pale blue eyes opened wide for the first time in weeks. She still didn’t speak, but she smiled like a beauty queen as she listened to the voice of her brother, her only remaining sibling.

On the Saturday, she choked when we tried to give her water. She ate nothing.

On the Sunday, we all slept late. Late for the tropics being 8:00. I had breakfast, played with Jack, and marveled at what a lovely day it was. Not too hot, and totally clear. The water in Westerhall Bay was so untroubled I could see the ocean floor from my verandah. Around 9:00, my mother bathed and dressed Grandma, as she did every day. Afterwards, Mom carried her to her chair, and tried to get her comfortable. That didn’t work, so she laid her down in bed. And then she realized she was gone.

There’s too much to say about that day and the few days that followed. About how Cheryl came straight over from church, wearing her wedding dashiki, the one Mom made for her. How Lyndon, the roughest and toughest of West Indian men, cried like he was mourning his own mother. How neighbors showed up to visit with Vera one last time. How my mom didn’t want them to take her body, and didn’t want to call anyone. How Jack saw his great-grandmother covered and carried out. How Jack heard Mom keening, and how several days later, in the airport on one of our layovers on the way to Indiana, when we were finally alone together for a few minutes, he told me how that had made him afraid. He told me that he understood that “Ba” was gone, that “Ba” was dead. Then he assured me that he was OK, and that he knew his own grandmother was just fine. I shook my head in amazement at my son, only two years old, yet so understanding, so wise and so brave.

I went through the thousands of pictures on my laptop and made an album called “Best of Vera” to send to the family. It included this photo:

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There was also the lovely impromptu prayer service we had at the house. Grenadians really know how to celebrate a death. (Yeah, I said celebrate. Don’t judge me. You’ll understand when I get to the eulogy.) We talked, we cried, we prayed, and we sang, all together. When it came my turn to choose a song, I choose “Silent Night”. I hadn’t written anything, but I knew that I was going to be eulogizing Grandma in Indiana, and that this was my dress rehearsal. As we stood in a circle on the verandah, holding hands, I told them what I was going to say at the funeral about them and their Grenada. Then I thanked them. And I praised them for their respect for the elderly, their approach to the end of life. I confessed that I was in awe of their spiritual rightness.

jillian-kay-cheryl